Tracking 400-yr-old family roots in Indian milieu

While tracing one’s genealogical roots is all a rage in the West, it is yet to find traction in India, where tracing  one’s ancestral roots is all but impossible. But that did not deter Claudius Pereira, who with help of his six siblings wrote a sprawling saga, Echoes in footprints, that dates all the way back to the 17th century. The book, set to be officially released on May 1, will also be released in the US and London.

The book, which mainly focuses on how Pereira’s father raised seven children as a single parent, starts in 1673, when Pereira’s ancestors were among those who came and settled down in India from France.

“My great great grandfather James Bernard Pereira wanted one of his sons to become a priest in Madras. But my great grandfather was sent back home by Father Superior who saw him play football and figured he should pursue that instead. But James was furious at his son and in his rage chopped his leg off,” said Claudius, who started working on the book in 2006, when he was visiting his siblings, as a way to keep the memory of his father alive.

His great grandfather never became a priest. He instead got married and had four children, one of whom became a priest. In order to trace his family’s at times tragic past, Claudius even went to London, to access the birth and death certificates of his great grandparents. “The British had kept impeccable records, so I found even the marriage certificate signed by my great grandfather,” he beamed. But it was through his grandparents that he got a wealth of information.

“My grandfather’s brother was a priest himself and he set up my grandfather and his wife. He was at that time a railway ticket collector and my father, Clarence Joseph, was one of six children,” added Claudius.

However the book centres on his father, and how his family over several generations merged spirituality with their circumstances. “I was three years old when my mother passed away. My father had to raise seven children by himself. My oldest sister, then 13, had to take up cooking and taking care of us. He had to pawn my grandmother’s jewellery to keep our family going,” he said.
Claudius’ father worked as a telephone operator in a gold mine.

“Due to conditions in the goldmines, he lost his hearing and developed severe asthma and my brother when he got older, joined a gold mine company as well, but by that time the gold mining business started declining,” he adds. The book also chronicles Clarence Joseph’s brief struggle with cancer in the early 90s.

“At that time they didn’t know much about it. Even right now we don’t really know what it was. But his struggle was brief and his death is chronicled in this book by my siblings,” he said. With religious overtones, the book  looks at its historic context and focuses more on familial struggles.

“This is our book about how we came up in life. How we weathered the struggles. Everyone will find some form of inspiration from this book,” he adds. However tracing one’s history in India is close to impossible, says Claudius. “Only few families  had records. People here can only get pockets of their life history. But my research led me to people who were my cousins, but I didn’t even know existed!” he exclaims.